Vegging Out

Written by Tony Stith 

I’m glad the weekend is finally here. It's been a stressful week. All I could think of doing after leaving work on Friday was to get home, grab the remote, claim some couch real estate, and use as little brain power as possible. Basically, I just wanted to veg (pronounced “vej”) out.

I'm confident I wasn't the only one on the highway that evening who felt that way. In fact, our lifestyles have gotten so hectic that“vegging out” has become quite the national pastime. Whole industries are dedicated to helping people find new ways to do absolutely nothing. They couldn't find a group of more willing consumers. Given the chance to finally relax, we readily reach for the remote, head to the theatre, crank up the stereo, turn on the video games, turn off our brains and become part of the plant kingdom.

The downside of our growing appetite for this type of mindless entertainment is that we spend less and less time pursuing activities that bring deep, lasting pleasure and satisfaction. Activities such as learning to play an instrument, mastering another language, reading a classic piece of literature, studying God’s word, spending time in prayer or thoughtful meditation have, for many, become casualties of our frenzied lifestyles. These activities require work, effort and mental energy. When we’re tired, exhausted from the stresses of life, it’s natural for us to take the path of least resistance, least effort.

The other day I came upon a scripture, a prayer of David, that had quite an impact on me. In Psalms 119:37 David asks God to… “Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things, And revive me in Your way.” To put it in the modern vernacular, “Help me to put down the remote; and get fired up about the things that matter."

It’s a prayer I’ve begun to make my own of late. I don't want to always go down the path of least resistance. I don't want to constantly give in to the mindless pursuits that saturate this culture and so easily divert my attention. It might take some effort. It might mean re-ordering my priorities somewhat. But I'm determined to get off the couch and get engaged in pursuits that really matter, that truly bring lasting value and satisfaction. Chief among them the things that strengthen my relationship with my God.

Not that I’ll never allow myself to “veg out” again. Sometimes the brain just needs to sit on idle. It’s okay once in awhile. It’s just a practice whose roots I refuse to let go too deep.

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"I will meditate on Your precepts, and contemplate Your ways. I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word." Psalms 119:15 - 16 

Delighting in the Sabbath...Completely

What a blessing is the Sabbath. It’s especially a blessing for we who live in a culture where each minute seems to be loaded to capacity. If not for the Sabbath our lives would be lost in a sea of busyness…running here, running there. There are so many important places to be and important things to do. Our culture teaches us to put our lives in overdrive. Even our leisure time has become a harried experience. How many of us, after a long weekend getaway or an extended vacation, feel the need to recuperate from the experience?

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to recognize that the prolonged stress of all this busyness takes it’s toll on our physical, mental and spiritual well-being. We just weren’t designed to take that kind of abuse. That’s why God gave us the wonderful blessing of the Sabbath. In it He holds up a stop sign at the end of each week allowing us to step out of the cyclone that is often our lives and focus and meditate on Him.

Meditation is a quality that has largely been lost in our society, even among many Christians. Take time to think? Who has the time?! There’s too much to do, too much to accomplish. It’s a concept that many of us who have observed the Sabbath for some time and are accustomed to taking one day out of seven to rest might even find challenging to apply. Oh, we have no problem curtailing our normal weekly physical activities. Curtailing the train of our mental activity, however, is a different matter altogether. It’s a little more of a challenge to set aside the cares, concerns and preoccupations of the work week in favor of meditating and focusing on the things of God.

Isaiah 58:13 tells us that we should call the Sabbath a delight. To delight in something entails giving it our full attention. Delighting takes us a step beyond merely resting from our physical activity. It’s about resting the complete self…physically, mentally, and spiritually.

Of course, we understand that entering His rest doesn’t mean a complete cessation of physical or mental activity. The Sabbath rest was given as a means of redirecting our physical and mental activity toward Him. We find our rest in Him.

God wants us to enter completely into His rest; to be renewed, not just physically, but mentally and spiritually as well. Just putting our physical activity on hold while our brain continues to work on overdrive is analogous to flooring the accelerator of an automobile while pressing our foot on the brake. The car might not be going anywhere, but would anyone say it is truly at rest? No, it’s only by fully delighting in the Sabbath; resting the complete self; that true renewal can occur.

What a wonderful gift our God has given us in this day. Let’s delight in it…completely.

The Wonder Years

"Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord. The fruit of the womb is a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, So are the children of one’s youth. Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them..."  - Psalms 127:3-5

My daughter and I watched one of our favorite shows together the other night, The Wonder Years. It's the reflections of a grown man, reliving the ups and downs, the joys, the pains, the "wonder" of his adolescent years.  Though uniquely his, they are, in many ways, experiences universal to all of us. It's a great show. 

As I watched with my daughter I realized that, as a young high school student, she was living through the final days of her own Wonder Years.  

She has her own memories, her own drama playing out in the hallways between classes, over the seat backs of her school bus and, in an environment unique to her generation,  her texting and Facebooking world.  Maybe that's why she enjoyed watching the show as much as I did. 

I realized as I sat there with my daughter that even as both my children have lived through their Wonder Years, I've experienced them from a different perspective.  My memories of my kids wonder years are rich. They include:

• Wrestling matches on the carpet
• Nightly stare down contests
• Secret family handshakes
• Pillow fights followed by a bed time prayer at the side of the bed.
• Running to dad to pull out a sliver
• Squeels of joy over my special Sabbath morning pancakes and beef bacon.
• Jockeying for the best position on daddy's lap, as if it was the only chair in the room 
• A daily dose of "kugs" (code word for kisses and hugs) before heading out the door each morning 
• The yell of Daddy's Home! and the rush into my waiting arms when I enter our home after a long day
• and many, many more, too numerous to mention...

Don't get me wrong.  It's not that I don't enjoy my kids as much as they are getting older. I do....immensely. Watching them grow and mature brings a lot of joy to my wife and I. It's just that I wasn't quite ready for the wonder of those early years to fade away as quickly as they have.  


So yesterday morning, as my daughter was getting ready to rush out the door to the bus without so much as a "see ya", my nostalgia got the better of me. "Hey, wait just a minute princess!" I protested.  "You're not getting out of here without a kiss goodbye."  To which she stopped, spun around, threw me a quick air kiss, with a sigh said "love you daddy" and was out the door...leaving me to feel a little needy for asking. Ah, the fading remnants of the wonder years.   I guess I have to let them go sometime.  I realize it's the natural order of things, and that each particular stage of their lives will hold it's own new set of wonders, but, for me, none as much as those early days. I only wish I had taken more time to appreciate them while they were here.


So, my advice to parents of young children: Don't take them for granted. Don't let the stresses of life, the struggle to make ends meet, to establish your career, to build the home of your dreams, the hassles of carting them from place to place, activity to activity, distract you from enjoying the wonder.  Appreciate each and every wonderful moment with your young children to its fullest.  Like me, you'll be looking back on them with nostalgia before you know it. 

You Might be a Lukewarm Christian if...

Written by Tony Stith

"So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will vomit you out of my mouth." Revelation 3:16

You might be a luke-warm christian if...

...you wear nicer clothes to work than you do to church.
...you have more notes on your refrigerator than you do in your Bible.
...you think redemption is something you do with a winning lottery ticket.
...all but a few of the pages of your Bible are still stuck together.
...you skip church because of a headache but go to work with the flu.
...not only do you not know where to find Habakuk, you didn't even know it existed.
...the most profound words you've read all week came from the inside of a fortune cookie.
...you think Communion is something you do with nature.
...the church welcome committee reintroduces themselves to you whenever you go to church.
...you wear your golf clothes to church on warm summer days.
...you know how many tiles are on the church ceiling.
...you're jealous of the kid napping on the floor one isle in front of you.
...your attendance at church can be tracked by the local weather forecast.
...you get your best sleep on your knees.
...the closest you've gotten to sharing your faith was saying "bless you" when someone sneezed.
...you think the Patriarchs are Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
...when the minister asks the congregation to turn to the "love chapter" you turn to the Song of Solomon.
...you believe the Proverbs were written by someone named Confucius.
...you give more money to the parking meter at work than you put in the church offering.
...you wish your children were still babies so you'd have an excuse to get up and leave during the message.
...your children are babies and you purposely provoke them to cry so you can get up and leave during the message.
..."Amen" to you is translated "Thank God it's over!"
...you can't understand what pro-lifers are all worked up about.
...you watch Oprah to get fed spiritually.
...the last time you really prayed was on 9/11.

Our Spiritual Blackberry

I have a confession.  I'm addicted to my Blackberry.  If you don't have one you may not identify but trust me, it's addictive.  Maybe that's why some affectionately call it the "Crack" berry.  It's like a drug. Now, I know there are those of you out there with your I-phones and your Droids that would beg to differ. Yes, you have more apps, bigger touch screens, cooler graphics...I get all that. But my Blackberry has one thing that sets it apart.  A little blinking red light.  Yep. For me that's what blows all of the competition out of the water.  


I guess I'm not really addicted to the Blackberry as much as I am to that little blinking light.  Whenever I get a text or someone sends me an email, that little red light on the top right corner of the phone blinks to let me know I have something waiting. And I have to admit, I've developed a bit of a co-dependent relationship with it. It needs me to keep it's battery charged, and I need it for the sense of belonging it gives me.   It blinks to say someone cares, someone needs me. It reminds me that I'm important to someone out there.  It provides me with a sense of connectedness, like a guiding beacon, a lifeline.  If I go too long without seeing the little red light I begin to feel, well, isolated, lonely. Okay, maybe I need an intervention.  Is there a Blackberry 12 step program?


You know, I wish there was a little red blinking light on the top corner of my Bible. A light letting me know when God has something He wants me to hear.  A blinking light alerting me to just the right scripture I need at the right time for the particular circumstance or trial I'm going through.  Wouldn't that be awesome?!  Kind of a spiritual Blackberry if you will. I want one of those, don't you? 


Wait a minute, in a way it already exists.  In fact, David owned one. Talk about a man ahead of his times! In Psalms 43, David writes:


"Oh, send out Your light and Your truth, let them lead me: let them bring me to Your holy hill, and to your tabernacle." - Psalms 43:3


David wasn't asking for a spiritual Blackberry, he had one.  In a sense, it was as if he was holding it in his hands waiting, asking, pleading for the light to start blinking.  His focus was glued there. You might say he was a little addicted to it, a little dependent on it. It brought him a sense of connection, a sense of being in relationship with God.  It was a guiding beacon in his life when everything around him was in turmoil. 


Jesus came that you and I could have access to our own spiritual Blackberry.  In John 16, He told His disciples, 


“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.  However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.  He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you."  - John 16:12 - 14


In sending His Holy Spirit, He gave us a powerful blinking light to guide us into all truth.  To connect us to Him. To be our Comforter, our Teacher. To bring us into remembrance of all that He has taught us in His word, when we need it the most.  His spirit is the blinking red light of our spiritual Blackberries. And if we just get in tune with it; allow ourselves to become dependent on it; let it be our guiding beacon; let it be our lifeline - we'll never feel isolated or alone. 


So maybe my love for the little red blinking light on my Blackberry is a bit unhealthy. I'll work on it.  But, I think you'll agree, being dependent on the guiding light of our spiritual Blackberry is a healthy addiction worth feeding the rest of our lives.  


"Send out your light and truth! Let them lead me to your holy hill..."
Translation: C'mon light, start blinking!

Love is a Decision

Written by Tony Stith

My son got his first job yesterday.  He'll be working the morning shift at a small restaurant in a Fitness club near where he attends school.  He's very excited.  He called me at work during the middle of the day. The timing of his call was ironic.  I was bogged down in the middle of a never ending project, clicking away at the computer, willing the clock to move just a little faster so I could pack up my lunch bag and my laptop and go home.   Not that every day is like this. As with any job there are good days and bad, ups and downs, successes and failures. His call started me reflecting.  There was a time when I loved this job. There were new challenges, new opportunities, and excitement about the contribution I could make.  Some of that excitement, that promise had faded.  Was this now just a job, mindless labor?  Was I just going through the motions just to collect a paycheck?  And, if I am going through the motions, what's the point?

Warning: Spiritual segway

Cut to the Sabbath.  Finally, the long work week is over.  Time to do what I want to do.  Sleep in, read a good book, maybe see a movie with the family, ride my bike, take it easy.  Oh yeah, then there's that church thing. Gotta do that. Oh, and maybe a little extra time (emphasis on "little") Bible Study and Prayer.  Hmmm....

There was a time when that church thing, that Bible Study and prayer thing, would have ranked a little higher, no, a lot higher on my list of desirable things to do "on my own time."   I guess some of the excitement, some of the enthusiasm for those things has waned over the years.  Had my faith simply become my religion?  Had my first love become my 4th, 5th or 6th obligation?  Was I just going through the motions, because that's what people who call themselves Christians are supposed to do, mark off our "spiritual to-do lists so we can get on guilt free with the things we really want to do with our free time?  Has my faith become like going to work?  Ughh...I wish my son hadn't gotten so excited about getting that job!


In Revelation 2:1 - 5 Jesus, through the apostle John, says to the Ephesian church, after praising them for their labour in the faith, tells them: "Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love."

The Ephesus church was getting some things right, doing a lot of the right things, but there was something missing, they were just going through the motions.  What should have been a labor of love, had become just labor.

Jesus, loving as He is, doesn't just leave them hanging with no solutions.  He provides a two step solution...

"Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place—unless you repent."

Step 1: Remember.  I guess that's what my sons phone call at work had done for me.  Caused me to begin remembering. Remembering what an awesome blessing it is to know Him. Remember that, of all the firsts I have ever experience or will ever experience, this first love is by far the greatest.  If I truly appreciate it for the blessing it is, my excitement for it should never be allowed to wane.

Step 2: Repent and do the first works.   My wife and I read a book by Gary Smalley when we were first married.  It was called Love is a Decision. I highly recommend it for any new couple. Basically, the message of the book is that Love between a husband and wife is not simply an emotional sense of well being, a feeling.  Love, true love, is a conscious decision we make, to love the other person through good times and bad, when we feel like it and when we don't because, as anyone who has been married for more than five years will tell you, sometimes you just don't. Love that is based on emotion will be shallow, inconsistent, and disillusioning.  Love based on a decision, in contrast, will grow richer and deeper over time. It will see its way through the hard times, the mundane times, the hurtful times. The highs will be higher and the lows will be not so low.

I think that is what Jesus is telling the Ephesians and us by extension.  He's saying in effect, "So you just don't feel the same excitement about Me as you once did? So what! My relationship with you isn't based on your feeling. Make a decision to Love Me like you did when our relationship first began. Put your faith, put Me first.  Do the first works."  You know what, over time, your love for Me will grow richer and deeper. It will survive the tests and trials. The good times and the bad. The disappointments.  The lows won't be quite so low and the highs....well, you can't even imagine!

Hmmm....
Suddenly I'm even more excited the Sabbath has arrived.  Time to invest in that decision.

Maybe I'll pick up the pace on that project at work next week, too.

All that Glitters

Written by Tony Stith

Awhile ago I read an article about the California gold rush of 1848. That winter, people from all walks of life set out for the west coast state. Many pawned their possessions to get there. The gold seekers, also known as Forty-Niners or Argonauts, joined the rush from as far off as Europe and Australia. Many Chinese also flocked to San Francisco to join in the gold rush.
Now some of these gold seekers didn’t know the first thing about mining or gold. A lot of them found, instead of gold, a look-alike called pyrite, or fools gold. It looks like gold, but it’s worthless. The problem is, there was a lot more of it than the real thing, so a lot of people fell for it. But there is a discernible difference. Pyrite tends to more brittle than gold, it tends to fall apart; it doesn’t last, while gold is soft and malleable. Gold also doesn’t tarnish; its value and its beauty don't fade. Also, pyrite tends to be plentiful…it’s common, while gold is precious, a rare commodity.
Many of the Forty-Niners would stumble on some of this stuff and think they were finding great riches. Others fell prey to crooks who would pawn this worthless substance off as the real thing.
The Forty-Niners weren't the only people to ever fall for an impostor. There are plenty of things in this world that glitter that aren't gold. But did you know that people can fall prey to the same type of delusion when they begin digging around for God? In their quest to find God, some fall for what looks like the real deal, feels like the real deal, but is really just fools gold.
The reason some fall into this trap is that they really don't know what they are looking for in the first place. They seek a God who they believe will meet some emotional or physical need; failing to understand that physical blessings, a fulfilled life, a sense of personal purpose, a feeling of acceptance... although they sparkle like gold, are not the real deal.
The fact is that nowhere in the Bible does God promise that if we follow Him we will have the best career, the nicest house, the happiest marriage, or the most fulfilling life. Nowhere does he promise that we will never get sick, never have bad things happen. To enter into a relationship with Him expecting these to result is setting ourselves up for disillusionment. It won’t be long before you’ll realize that Christians have problems. They get sick, they get in accidents, they die, they have marriage problems, lose jobs...just like non-Christians.
Make no mistake; the Christian life is not the easy route to take. Rather than having a charmed life, God says that your life will be more difficult. It will be filled with tests and trials. The inevitable realization that what they thought was gold was really just a bag of worthless rocks can be profoundly discouraging to some. Rather than resume their search for the real thing, sadly some chuck it all and walk away.
It doesn't have to be that way if we understand what the real gold looks like in the first place. Colossians 1:19-21 "For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled."
The person who truly seeks a relationship with God will do so, not because having it will bring some kind of emotional fulfillment or physical reward, but rather, because of a heart-felt desire for connection with Him. They have come to understand that they are sinners who have been alienated from Him and are in need of forgiveness. Their desire for connection, for reconciliation, motivates their search for Him.
1 John 3:1-2 tells us, "How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God. And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." Once reconciled to God; once brought into relationship with Him; they become His children. They become members of His eternal Family. And that awesome understanding, my friends, provides wealth beyond comprehension.
Matthew 6:19 tells us to lay up our treasure in Heaven, not on this earth. God is less interested in what we get out of this life…than how he’s using the events and circumstances in our lives now to help us recognize our need for Him and to prepare us for our future role as members of His Family. There ain't no substitutes. Being reconciled to Him; gaining eternal entrance into His Family; that's the gold He has to offer…and it’s the real deal.

Minute by Minute

Written by Tony Stith
 

One of my favorite music groups as a kid was the Doobie Brothers. One song of theirs I liked in particular was titled "Minute by Minute". I never really thought about what the song was about, I just liked the beat...Minute by Minute by Minute by Minute...I just keep holding on....

Many people don't really know how to live minute by minute do they? Although there is some merit in looking and planning for the future, many of us tend to spend too much of our time there. We're constantly looking ahead to the next big event, racing to and fro across the face of the earth, checking our watches and marking our calendars. Precious little time is spent enjoying the moment, being 100 percent in the present.

Even though it might be the byproduct of living in our frenzied, fast food society, I don't think it's a healthy one, and certainly not one conducive to personal or spiritual growth. In fact, I would guess that all of our rushing ahead to be somewhere else or to do something else must at times frustrate God.

In Psalms 46:10 He tells us to "Be still and know that I am God."

Being still is a tall order for a lot of us. But God wants us to more than just occasionally step out of our frenzied pace and focus on the here and now. He's saying, I have something I want to teach you right now, in this moment...so stop running around doing and planning all of these things you think are so important and be still...take the time to know me...to reflect on the creation I have made, to enjoy the family I have given you, and the relationship you have with Me. Be still and know that I am God. You can't very well do that if your constantly racing ahead at light speed.

So maybe we can take a life lesson from that Doobie brothers song...well, at least the chorus. It's the only part I remember anyway. Minute by Minute by Minute by Minute.....

A Disastrous Miracle

In his book titled “It Is Toward Evening”, Vance Havner tells the story of a small town that made it’s living entirely from growing cotton. It was not a great living; nevertheless, it was a living. Then calamity struck as the boll weevil invaded the community, destroyed the economy, and threatened to ruin everyone. The farmers were forced to switch to peanuts and other crops that eventually brought them greater return than they would ever have made by raising cotton. Ultimately, what they thought was a disaster became the basis for undreamed of prosperity. To mark their appreciation, they erected a monument-to the boll weevil. To this very day in that little southern town, that monument stands as a celebration of that disastrous miracle.

Too often we want to forget painful memories…tribulations in our life, don’t we? We want to move on to good times and leave the past behind.

I think one mistake we in the Christian world make is to focus only on all of the ways we’ve been blessed while we gloss over the trials and tribulations that have been visited upon us. But God doesn’t want us to do that. He wants us to recognize the trials that we suffer as blessings in themselves…events that serve to prepare us for greater service to him.

1 Pet 5:10 tells us “But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you.”

God wants us to mark the path of our growth. He wants to use our disasters to produce miracles in our lives. The suffering that we endure often serves a far greater purpose than the good times that come our way. The blessings that come as a result of His purpose being fulfilled are eternal.

Obviously it’s difficult to pretend we enjoy going through hardship. I’m sure the farmers in that small town weren’t having a good time watching the boll weevils eat their livelihood. But if they could have seen the end of the story, the prosperity that would ultimately come out of disaster, they would have no doubt had reason to rejoice while the boll weevils were feasting.

As God’s children we do know the end of the story, don't we? In the midst of trouble, in the midst of hardship, we know that God is working out His plan. We don’t need to wait for that miracle to be completely fulfilled to rejoice. We can erect a monument of gratitude in our lives to daily express appreciation to Him for his deliverance from trials and the incredible miracle that He is accomplishing in us through His Son.

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"I will meditate on Your precepts, and contemplate Your ways. I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word." Psalms 119:15 - 16

The Past: Learning from it without Living in it

Someone once said that in life we have two choices. We can learn from the past or be doomed to repeat it. It’s good advice. Individually and collectively we must learn the lessons of history if we are to avoid the traps and pitfalls into which others before us or perhaps we ourselves have fallen. It’s advice, though, that should be taken with caution for the line between learning from the past and being a victim of it is thin indeed.

We may know of someone for who past experience has soured current aspects of their life. It may be the person who, because of one or several failed romantic relationship, has exiled themselves to a life of loneliness, refusing to risk further emotional trauma. Or it could be the person who having been raised in an abusive childhood situation determines to never bring children of their own into such a potentially painful world.

Whatever the hurts and injustices we've suffered or witnessed in the past, living in it rather than using it as a tutor to guide ourselves or others to a more successful future, makes us its victim.

I believe that we as Christians, perhaps more than most, have a tendency to fall into this trap. We as a group have very sensitive noses for justice. We are keenly aware of right and wrong and we have a definite desire to see righteousness prevail and evil punished. Although a desirable quality in most cases, this sensitivity has the potential to work against us. In a world where the evil too often emerge victorious and injustices are a daily occurrence, our spirits can easily become embittered, cynical and negative. Allowed to linger, this fixation on the injustices of the world can ultimately serve to rob us of our joy and inhibit our growth forward. We become victims of the past rather than its students.

In Philippians 3:12 through the example of Paul we are admonished to forget those things which are behind and reach forward to those things which are ahead.
In Matthew 10:16 Jesus tells us “Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves.”

Taken together, these passages encourage us to not let the past cripple us but rather to gain wisdom from the injustices we or others have witnessed or experienced, and use that wisdom to move forward in a positive, productive direction.

God wants us to look ahead to Him as the Author and Finisher of our faith and toward what He has in store for us. We can’t do that if we are constantly obsessed by what’s back over our shoulder.

Yes, it’s true. Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. We shouldn’t ignore the past. Let’s learn from it, gain wisdom because of it, but not be victimized by it. It’s okay to visit there once in awhile but it’s definitely not a place in which we should live.

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"I will meditate on Your precepts, and contemplate Your ways. I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word." Psalms 119:15 - 16